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Tuesday 24 december 2019

Christmas Lights

ORANJESTAD — Christmas in Aruba would not be com-
plete without a visit to see the Christmas Lights around
the island. By just driving around on the main roads you
can enjoy a variety of creativity with colorful lights being
displayed on various Aruban homes. Also the majority of
the round-abouts are decorated.

If you are lucky enough you might hear Christmas car-
ols and “gaitas” at any of these locations but also at the
malls and stores. Gaita is a style of Venezuelan folk music
from Maracaibo in Zulia State. It is possibly derived from
gaits, the Gothic word for goat, the animal whose skin
generally is used for the membrane of the furro instrument
(kind of tambura with stick). Other instruments used in
gaita include maracas, cuatro, charrasca and tambora
(Venezuelan drum). Song themes range from humorous
and love songs to protest songs. The local gaita bands
are composed mostly of a group of ladies who sing with
angelic voices while they dance in a choreographic
manner.

The map shown here will give you an overview of the most
popular decorated places around the island. So hop into
your car or call a taxi driver to go around and enjoy the
spectacular Christmas scenes. We wish you a wonderful
Christmas.q

Aruba to Me

ORANJESTAD – Aruba Today likes to welcome read-
ers to participate in our newspaper. You can see that
in our Honored Guest-publications, specials like on
Valentine’s Day and on other occasions. Through-
out the year you are always welcome to send us
your vacation picture(s) together with completing
the sentence: Aruba to me is …….. (Email: news@
arubatoday.com)

For today’s newspaper we received a great picture
from Maggie Kinney from Hoosick Falls, NY.
She wrote to us:

Aruba to me is…. JOY!

Happy Holidays Maggie and family

from all of us at Aruba Today!